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Posts Tagged ‘jealousy’

In my experience, I’ve found only 2 ways to effectively deal with jealousy. Fortunately (or unfortunately), some of my friends are better-looking than me, taller than me, make more money than me, and are more popular with the ladies…

…Not that it’s a competition, but let’s face it, sometimes it is. And sometimes, it sure feels like you’re getting creamed.

One way to deal with jealousy is to tear the other person down. Diffuse. Detract. Talk trash. Obviously this is a very low-level way of coping, but sometimes you can’t help it and boy, does it feel good, am I right?

Jealousy is a beast that must be kept on a leash unless you want to end up on the wrong end of it. There are really 2 aspects to jealousy: (1) antagonism towards someone who has something you want, and (2) a compulsion to guard something you have to prevent its loss. In the first case, the focus is on what you don’t have; in the second, on what you won’t have. For the sake of discussion, we can think of them as Envy versus Fear of Loss.

In a way, Envy is like the good twin that can be allowed a longer leash. The reason being, through deliberate planning and action, envy can transform into unstoppable motivation. An enviable life can be modeled to better your own. You simply need to define the intermediate steps that would bridge the gap between where you are and where you want to be. For example, if you want to make a billion dollars but it seems beyond your grasp, then first focus on how to make a million dollars. And if a million dollars still seems surreal, then first focus on how to make 100,000 dollars. Keep breaking up your goal into smaller bits until you can emotionally digest it as a possibility.